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Monday, 1 December 2008

Saturday's Shooto event was awesome, I was there and took some pictures.

Hayakawa has an ability to get stuck in some submissions in the 2nd round. Here Nezu is close to ending the fight early, something that would have been a shame. Hayakawa was the better fighter in the 1st round, but Nezu took the second and it ended in a deserved draw.Atsushi Takeuchi was better than Katsuya Murofushi standing, and got in some good punches.

When the fight hit the ground, he looked in control there too.

Eventually Takeuchi get a guiliotine choke in that ended the fight in the second round.

Ogikubo wanted to take Tazawa down, and he did that in all the rounds. Unfortunately, Tazawa defended well and it ended in a draw.

The last 3 fights on this card were awesome on paper, first out was Takashi Nakakura against Bendy Casimir. I had picked this as a very close fight, and was wrong... Casimir looked good once the fight was standing, but on the ground Nakakura proved to be the better grappler. Nakakura landed some heavy punches.

Casimir was forced to give up his back and Nakakura took full advantage. With just seconds remaining in the first round he sunk in a deep rear-naked choke.

I think Casimir thought he could last the round and did not tap. But with 2 seconds left the ref was forced to stop the fight and Casimir was left unconcious.

A very strong performance by Nakakura!

The next fight was between Rumina Sato and Hatsu Hioki. In this fight Hioki didnt take long to get Rumina on the ground, and once there he got mount. The ref had to step in, Hioki's gnp was too much for the veteran.

The main event was the title fight between Hideki Kadowaki and "Lion" Takeshi. I think everyone expected Kadowaki to take this to the ground. I was surprised that he didnt immediately do that though. He was able to land some good shots on the challenger and for a second it looked like "Lion" was in danger.

Unfortuantely for Kadowaki, the fight did not end that way. "Lion" took round 2 and 3. In the end he also get the decision and was crowned the new champion.